Pictured at the moment when they were arrested, these are the two British girls accused of trying to smuggle cocaine worth more than £1.5million out of Peru in their suitcases.
Police in Lima claimed last night that Melissa Reid and Michaella McCollum Connolly had confessed their guilt.
The pair, who face lengthy sentences, have yet to be formally quizzed because officers have not been supplied with an English-speaking translator.
But Major Manuel Siclla, who heads the investigation, said: ‘They have admitted it informally to me and officers at the airport who arrested them.
‘They are okay but are obviously worried about their families and what the future holds for them.
‘Like anyone else involved in drugs smuggling, they will be tried and face long prison sentences if convicted. We take this problem very seriously in Peru and courts are very strict about enforcing the law.’
Former shop worker Miss Reid, 19, from Lenzie near Glasgow, and dancer Miss McCollum Connolly, 20, from Dungannon, County Tyrone, were arrested last Tuesday morning as they prepared to board an Air Europa flight from Lima to Madrid before taking a second plane to their final destination in Majorca.
Anti-drugs squad officers found nearly six kilos of cocaine hidden in food products in each of the women’s suitcases.
The pair are thought to have been recruited as drug mules on the promise of an all-expenses-paid holiday to Peru plus $12,000 each in cash by gang masters in Ibiza, where they had gone to work in bars and clubs over the summer.
It had been reported they were being held in the tough Santa Monica women’s jail in the Lima suburb of Chorillos.
But officers from the Peruvian anti-drugs squad revealed yesterday that they were in police cells.
Major Siclla, who has another week to interrogate them before handing them over to an investigating judge for further questioning, said: ‘They have a bed each and share a bathroom with other women. All the guards are female.
‘The women get three meals a day, typically porridge and bread for breakfast, lentils or refried beans for lunch and the same sort of dinner along with water and tea.
‘British consular staff have been to visit the women and they have been able to speak to their families with phone cards they left them. I can assure you they are not being held in hellhole conditions.’
[Mailonline]
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